Did You Think Prices For Intel CPUs Were OK Last Week? They Weren’t.

“the prices have been slower to fall, but we’d highly recommend that you keep an eye on the following pages, if you are looking for a good deal this week. So far, at Micro Center we’ve seen the beefy six-core Intel Core i7-6850K (3.60GHz) drop from $700 to $550, and the i7-6800K (3.40GHz) drop down to $360, from $500.”

You can stop it. Stop buying Intel. Better yet, don’t buy AMD either. Buy ARM, the processor that has multiple sources of production at competitive prices all year long. No need for a time-warp to get that for which you pay.

Further, notice that 0.2gHz more Hertz on the clock cost a bundle, $200 last week, and $190 this week. Don’t buy that either, if you must buy Intel. It’s a ripoff. Instead, get ARM where you can have a smaller, cooler, slower chip work full time instead of just at the time of sale. If you can’t find a product using ARM that fits your needs, demand it. If you demand it they will make it.

About Robert Pogson

I am a retired teacher in Canada. I taught in the subject areas where I have worked for almost forty years: maths, physics, chemistry and computers. I love hunting, fishing, picking berries and mushrooms, too.

23 Responses to Did You Think Prices For Intel CPUs Were OK Last Week? They Weren’t.

Then have the makers of that proprietary software push the cute little “Compile” button. Switching to another CPU ISA isn’t by any means impossible. Apple has done that not only once, but twice and even Microsoft has had ports of the full Windows NT operating system to multiple architectures.

ARM, AMD, Intel, NVidia, and some others. All using cross-licensed fin-FET technology, mostly made in the very same fabrication facilities. The price drops for older technologies across ALL suppliers as new higher density fabrication facilities come on-line. It is NOT a monopoly, although it certainly is a CARTEL.

The Wiz wrote, “Since the ARM chip happens also to be a RISC type chip, he feels (somehow) that he is justified as saying that ARM was there”.

“The official Acorn RISC Machine project started in October 1983. They chose VLSI Technology as the silicon partner, as they were a source of ROMs and custom chips for Acorn. Wilson and Furber led the design. They implemented it with a similar efficiency ethos as the 6502. A key design goal was achieving low-latency input/output (interrupt) handling like the 6502. The 6502’s memory access architecture had let developers produce fast machines without costly direct memory access hardware.”

BTW, ARM derived from Acorn RISC Machine… The company as we know it may not have existed back then but the architecture did and the same people worked on both projects.

No, Mr. DS, but he is being a wee bit disingenuous. 1983 is when the first of the RISC chips was created. Since the ARM chip happens also to be a RISC type chip, he feels (somehow) that he is justified as saying that ARM was there…

“Intel Atom was the brand name for a line of ultra-low-voltage IA-32 and x86-64 microprocessors by Intel Corporation. Atom was mainly used in netbooks, nettops, embedded applications ranging from health care to advanced robotics, and mobile Internet devices”

There was just a monopoly responding to a new product on the market hoping to stifle competition.

Ahem… I think you meant binary-compatible competition. An important detail.

Better yet, don’t buy AMD either. Buy ARM

People have proprietary software that is x86-only. But I am sure you have a cute lecture about how their needs are wrong. After all, you are the imbecile who urged your wife to retire from her job because the need to use “TOOS” arose for her to keep working.

Ivan wrote, “As old as you are it’s remarkable that you don’t realize how stock clearances work.”

At any age a wise consumer should realize how monopoly works. When competition arises, a monopoly drops prices to drive the competitor into an noncompetitive position. That stifles competition and fools unwise consumers. If Intel charges 3X what the price should be with market forces, and drops the price to 2X when competition arises, are you getting a deal? Nope. You are still paying too much. Meanwhile, Intel releases their next product at $1K+ and some fools still buy it because they need to boot a second faster. Meanwhile Intel’s CPU and the competitor’s CPU both idle in typical usage. If I needed to buy AMD64, I would go with AMD’s version just to keep Intel more honest. That doesn’t really help that much because AMD has such a small share, thanks to Intel paying OEMs to avoid AMD back in the day. That warping of the market hasn’t been undone yet. So, I intend to stay away from both, thanks to ARM being viable for my usage. So, ARM’s CPU is not idling all day long. It costs much less and I still get my computing done.

First Atom appeared in 2008. First ARM in 2011. Prior Atoms, Intel had Intel A100. Before A100, there was Pentium M (2003). Low-powered devices, esp. laptops, were an old goal for both Intel and AMD. Unless Intel had some kind of time-warp gate to peek into future, I can’t even imagine how ARM can play a whatever role in the story, let aside the fact that ARMs found their way into laptops only very recently. And very marginally.

Let’s see. How many Intel-powered smartphones are out there? Zero? How many Intel-powered NAS are there? A few maybe. Why the Hell does Atom even exist? ARM! What’s the price of a new Atom? $thousands? Nope, because of ARM.

If, last week, a CPU was worth $700 and this week the same CPU is worth $550, was there a time-warp? Did you fall into a black hole?

As old as you are it’s remarkable that you don’t realize how stock clearances work. Also, Intel still makes their own chips within the United States, unlike AMD and ARM. So unlike AMD, they aren’t paying child laborers in China pennies an hour and unlike ARM they aren’t licensing their designs to third party randos.

Your entire premise is weak; there is no Intel monopoly conspiracy. You not buying Intel or a few other Joe’s, not buying Intel, will not have them blink an eye. You are just hurting yourself, with your delusional statements of late.

ARM is a joke, and not widely supported.

Ripoff? How is an Intel CPU a ripoff?? My Intel Core i3-2100 on my UNRAID NAS, is $20 now used. Quit being a cheap ass.

My Mission

My observations and opinions about IT are based on 40 years of use in science and technology and lately, in education. I like IT that is fast, cost-effective and reliable. I do not care whether my solution is the same as yours. I like to think for myself.

My first use of GNU/Linux in 2001 was so remarkably better than what I had been using, I feel it is important work to share GNU/Linux with the world. I have been blessed by working in schools where students and school systems have benefited by good, modular software easily installed in most systems.

I have shown GNU/Linux to thousands of students and hundreds of teachers over the years and will continue in some way doing that until I die in spite of the opposition.